Then I proceeded to explain to her a little bit about podcasts, and how iTunes can be used to organize all her CDs.

I added a subscription to the Pray As You Go podcast; I showed her where the “update” button was, and when she clicked, it would download any new audio files for that podcast.

Next, I explained that iTunes could organize all her CDs, and I showed her how to import a CD. I showed her how to drag ‘n drop her favorite songs into a playlist.

I installed the FoxyTunes extension for Firefox, and found a skin with larger buttons. So now when she is browsing on her new speedy Internet connection, she can launch and control iTunes right in Firefox.

In the past, she had commented so many times that she always forgets to play her CDs while she is working on the computer. Now with all her CDs organized in iTunes, I think she will be able to play her favorite songs without too much trouble.

Today she called me and said “Guess what I am doing” Yep, she was importing a double CD from Barbara Streisand into iTunes and listening to her music! Mom, if you are reading this, I love you, and keep listening!

If your web hosting account is low on bandwidth, you might want to consider blocking use of the Firefox extension called Fasterfox. By adding a blurb to your robots.txt file, you can block this extension.

And speaking of Apple’s web site, I have always loved their web site, but since this last re-design, they are embedding Quicktime, and Firefox 1.5 is having a terrible time with it. In fact, FF 1.5 has a problem with any web page with embedded Quicktime lately. Don’t know if it is just on the Mac, or if Windows users are having a problem too.

Once it is installed, it is easy to find definitions for any text on a web page. Next time you are curious about a word or phrase, highlight the text, right-click and choose “Search Dictionary for “xxxx” from the context menu. A new tab/window will launch the definition page for the chosen word.

The power of Dictionary Search is in its ability to customize it for your own individual needs. I didn’t particularly like the default url that Dictionary Search was using to search for definitions, so I changed it.

In the Extensions Manager, (Tools>Extensions) select DictionarySearch and at the bottom of the manager, choose the Options button.

Here you will find options for specifying up to four separate choices for searches. As you can see from my screen shot, I chose http://dictionary.reference.com, http://thesaurus.reference.com and http://en.wikipedia.org as my choices.

When altering the urls, make sure to paste in the exact results url for that particular site. For example, when searching for the word “colorful” at Thesaurus.com the results url is:

http://thesaurus.reference.com/search?q=colorful

So, the url typed into options would be

http://thesaurus.reference.com/search?q=$

Don’t forget to include the $ at the end of the url.

Each search url will be added to the context menu. (note: The text typed in text box will display in the context menu. Make sure to also include the $ symbol.)

Click the “Help” link when you need a brief reminder for these settings. And I hope you enjoy the extension as much as I do.

With the official release of Firefox 1.0 today, the Boston Globe included an article Web Power to the People which discusses Firefox and a little on the open source community. I love that Firefox is becoming more mainstream!

Is it bad to be so fickle. Switching back and forth from browser to browser. I can’t make a decision on which blogging systemI like the best. One day I like one program, and the next I am back to something else.

Today, I am back to FireFox as my default browser. I love Opera, but Drag’nDrop and the ability to save form data were sorely missed while browsing. So, I imported my Opera bookmarks, and started my love affair with FireFox all over again. I found a nice clean theme (Archaic 0.2.1) and organized my workspace perfectly.

[note: The big reason I originally switched to Opera was because the Publish page for Expression Engine was displaying with a huge horizontal scroll in FireFox. Thanks to Farron, I altered the css file, and it now displays perfectly.]

Tomorrow, who knows which browser I will be using! Fickle fickle fickle!